Thanks for that, I got to watch it again -- first time in ten years at least.

I, too, was strongly reminded of that scene while reading the shapeshifting duel, but then again, with the childhood I had, I doubt I can ever watch/read about a shapeshifting duel without having the Mim vs. Merlin fight replay in my head.

The skinwalker was... cool, sure, but he was lacking in a way. He had two original characteristics, one of which was his shapeshifting; but (the fight against Injun Joe excepted) he didn't make much use of it. He sometimes changed forms but that looked like a decorative gadget. Who cares if your enemy looks like a bull or a monkey, if you have a giant fireball hurled at your head anyway?... It's like when someone writes a story in first or second person because they've never tried it before, but without exploiting fully the concept of first or second person. It looks pretty and shiny and different but it's useless.

The second original characteristic was his ability to feed off his enemies' fear (I was reminded of Dementors here). But... well, same thing. We didn't see him use it that much. In the end, he just felt like yet another centuries-old superpowerful superstrong magic-wielding demon.

The nuke was cool though.

I loved DemonReach; it didn't feel like a cheap power-boost at all, but an alliance, and the introduction of a new character -- a freaking island, too. Generally speaking I've always been a fan of the concept of a place (island, forest, river, city, whatever) having its own personality and spirit. I would be hard pressed to explain why. Fact remains that idea always tickles my imagination in just the right spot.

Many characters got a new depth in this book. Dresden didn't change much, neither did Murphy; Luccio... Well. Luccio got manipulated so thoroughly, I wonder why we haven't seen a resurgence of her wounded pride. While breaking up with Dresden she sounded very reasonable and sincere. If I were her, i.e. if I were a two-centuries-old Italian soldier who had been manipulated into getting all mushy with the local boytoy, whom I rather liked but nothing more, I'd reasonably be reluctant to get close to anyone again (which she was) -- and sincerely saddened by the whole thing (which she was) -- but most of all I'd be pissed, and that, she wasn't.

It didn't bother me when I read the scene, but thinking back, I was a little surprised at the utter lack of thirst for revenge.

Morgan got the role of the arsehole-who-would-do-anything-for-the-girl-he-loved-even-though-she-rejected-him (wonder who that calls to mind). He was pretty good though. Still himself. And we got a few glimpses at what kind of life he must've had and how it shaped him into the man Dresden knew. (Again, wonder who that calls to mind. I need to stop reading Harry Potter.)

I was glad to have a little tête-à-tête between the Merlin and Dresden. It was a thoroughly entertaining scene, giving a glimpse of the Merlin's personality that wasn't as clichéd as I feared.

Molly wasn't as annoyingly rebellious as in previous books. She also proved to be likely to, in the Inquisition's words (the real one, not the DLP member), relapse one day. That's interesting. I had gotten used to seeing her as impatient, strong-willed, scared of most of the scary stuff, gifted for a couple of things, mostly nice and harmless -- all in all a nice Typical Female Apprentice postcard. This book reminded me she could turn into someone really dangerous if she slipped on the road of Black Magic again.

Thomas is back to what he first was -- or rather, what he should have been from the beginning. He was probably toying with the idea of vanquishing his Hunger long before Justine all but died at his hands, likely since he first fell in love with her, in fact. Now he's back to being a predator. He doesn't even pretend he wants to fight his nature. Therefore, like Molly, he got interesting. I hadn't felt that interested in Thomas since he joined the Erlking.

No other thoughts for now.

EDIT: right, forgot -- every time Dresden came home he found Molly and Morgan at each other's throats, with Mouse in between. That had me laugh. Aloud. In a public park full of kids and pigeon-lovers.

 

He probably doesn't actively remember it all (though presumably it all is in his mind, somewhere). However, whatever Lash did regarding reading the book and processing it super fast, it was still Harry who had to cast the spell to reanimate Sue, so he presumably knows that much. Which is probably a fair amount, relatively speaking.

 

The necromancy spell had nothing to do with the Word of Kemmler. It was just a (beginner's) necromancy spell.

The Word detailed the Darkhallow, presumably the theory behind the Darkhallow and maybe some other high-level necromancy rituals/tricks. Dresden flipped through the book. That was in German. I doubt he remembers that much.

Realising how to use Necromancy against a blampire though? That's all Dresden.

 

And how, other than from the Word of Kemmler, do you think he would know how to do such a spell?

All he knew about practical Necromancy prior to that was how to access the power of death.

 

Lash perhaps? I seem to remember Dresden mentioning it was more of a brute force spell as well. I just find it silly Taure to think that a small book written by the greatest Necromancer of recent memory, that details an actual Rite of Ascension, would also include Necromancy 101.

 

Well, technically, Harry knew how to preform basic Necromancy, and even described how to do it to Butter's. But he probably learned from the book.

 

Harry from Storm Front would have been dead from shock when Morgan fell through his door.

 

Well, it is not just the shit they throw at him it is also the fact that each book is set a year apart from the other, more or less, which gives him plenty of time to get better, stronger and wiser.

 

When you think about it, most of the people Dresden has gone up against have been much older, more experienced, wiser, knew what was going on, and most were more powerful.

I would say the fact that he has managed to survive at all is a major testament to just how much he has changed since Storm Front.

Aurora, over half of the fallen angels at some point or another, Erlking, Justin, King Raith, Skinwalker, Peabody, THREE count em THREE fully trained necromancers, Cowl again, and Marva just to name a few.

 

While he has indeed survived hanging out with Lily, I think you mean Aurora, as Lily's never tried to hurt Harry.

 

Yep my bad, had been up for like 36 hours and drinking for 4.

 

Yep.

Harry described it as simple magic that required a lot of power(if I remember correctly) - something ideal for him.

Additionally, it was Halloween, Cowl was destroying the infrastructure, the city had a riot-happy/panicky atmosphere, the Wild Hunt was in town, the dark energies from the last few years were still around and so on and so forth.

It was absolutely the perfect night for Necromancy that you could find. I think that it even was outright said that on any other night, Harry probably wouldn't have been able to pull something like that off.

So a combination of the simplicity of the spell, Harry's talents for that kind of magic and massive environmental factors(the kind of environment that allowed for someone to pull enough dark energy to become a junior god a couple of hours later) resulted in Sue.

 

Something really bugs me. There is this "unknown" second traitor that was on Demonreach. Isn't Dresden omniscient on Demonreach? It should have been just "Oh, Peabody and (other traitor) are on the island." There should be no mystery with that.

 

The island just knew that there was a second person there, not who it was.

 

I don't think Demonreach's knowledge pertains to things that happen outside of itself. It wasn't able to tell who framed Morgan, for example. And as the identity of the second traitor had little to do with what happened on Demonreach, it didn't know it.

 

At most it would recognise their presence again. Maybe at a push know their face. But how would it know their name or who they were?

 

The island only registers presences IIRC. He knows how many people are on the island, and he uses other factors to determine who each of them is, but he has no way of knowing who the second traitor is. But would that serve to eliminate Ancient Mai as a suspect, since she was backing up Injun Joe at the time?

 

... Yes, Ancient Mai is no longer suspected as a traitor, because Peabody was brought out into the open.

 

Well, there were two traitors, so I was eliminating someone from the original pool of suspects that Harry and Eb had compiled. That second traitor is most likely someone new IMO, but it might still be one of the people from that first list. If I'm sounding like an idiot, forgive me. I only recently finished the series so far, haven't had a chance to go through again or anything like that.